Movie academy simplifies online voting; asks members to re-register

Nominees for the 2013 Academy Awards pose for a group portrait in February.… (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times )

The 2013 Oscars may have been deemed a success: Ratings were up and the best picture win for "Argo" was a nice capper to a tumultuous race ran by actor-director-producer Ben Affleck. One hitch, however, was the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences' initial efforts to migrate its approximately 6,000 voting members to online balloting for the awards for the first time.

Complaints flooded into the academy, with members carping about the cumbersome system that in some cases simply wouldn't function. The academy responded by giving members an additional 24 hours to vote in the nomination phase.

This season, the organization is hoping to streamline the system, urging members Friday -- two months before nomination voting begins -- to re-register for a site they promise will be easier to navigate.

When registering, members are now asked to choose whether they would prefer online or paper balloting. Though members can pick either, the academy is clearly pushing them to opt for the electronic method.

"Online voting is convenient and easy to use -- allowing you to vote from anywhere in the world and on any internet platform, whether you’re on location, in the office, or on vacation," said the email distributed Friday.

Though members will have to sign up again for a user name and password, now they should only have to sign up once. Last year the members had to have a separate user name and password for the member site and to vote.

Also promised is a streamlined process, whereby if a member can't recall his/her password, he or she can simply create a new one on the spot and won't have to reach out to the customer service department.

And finally, Oscar voters will no longer have to enter a VIN number in addition to a password when registering for the site. The organization has eliminated that step.